Typhoon Megi Path

Typhoon Megi Path, (CP) – Efforts to find a bus with 19 people swept away by floods have been hampered by raging currents on Tuesday in central Vietnam when the country’s record overall mortality floods and heavy rains hit 41, officials said.

Eighteen other people on the bus swam to safety or were rescued after clinging to trees and utility poles, including one that emerged later Monday. The bus was removed from the main road from the central highland province of Dak Nong province in northern Nam Dinh early Monday morning, said Phan Van Dan, a local police chief.

The bus skirting a police roadblock divert traffic from the road, which was covered by up to 24 inches (60 centimeters) of water. The pilot survived and was questioned by police, Dan said.

The army has been using metal detectors to search for the bus, but their efforts were in vain.

“River currents are very strong to make the research operations very difficult,” Dan said by telephone from the province of Ha Tinh, where he was chief of police in Nghi Xuan District.

Among the survivors were Huu Thanh Luong, 32, and daughter of 2 years. The father swam for two hours in the strong currents, clinging to her child before he managed to swim to safety.

“We were asleep when the driver yelled, asking passengers to break windows,” Thanh was quoted by Thanh Nien newspaper as saying. “I held my daughter tight and exited the bus in panic. I swam with one hand and another hand holding my daughter.”

Elsewhere, in Nghe An, Ha Tinh and Quang Binh, floods have killed 40 people while two remain missing, disaster officials said. Another person was killed in Thua Thien Hue by a whirlwind.

Up to 47 inches (120 centimeters) of rain was beating the central region last week, flooding 200,000 homes and forcing 142,000 people to flee, according to the national flood and storm control committee.

Central Vietnam has also suffered more flooding earlier this month that killed 66 people.

More rain was reported in some areas of the central region Tuesday, causing floodwaters to rise in some places. He began slowly declining in other areas, officials said.

Forecasters predicted that the typhoon Megi, which hit the Philippines on Monday, probably hit southern China and Vietnam to avoid.

Meanwhile, state media reported Tuesday that the Vietnamese government will discuss with China on return of nine Vietnamese fishermen still stuck on the disputed Paracel Islands in the South China Sea once Typhoon Megi has ended.

The fishermen were arrested by China, but were released. They were returned to the islands last Saturday after a Chinese patrol boat has rescued in a storm. The islands are near the path of Typhoon Megi.